for frankly I hated to go
to the Talberts' with the news. Moreover, it would be a humiliating
confession to make that I had forgotten to ask Goward about the letter,
when everybody knew that that was what I had called upon him for, and
when I thought of all the various expressions in the very expressive
Talbert eyes that would fix themselves upon me as I mumbled out my
confession, I would have given much to be well out of it. Nevertheless,
since there was no avoiding the ordeal, I resolved to face the music,
and five minutes later entered the dining-room at my father-in-law's
house with as stiff an upper lip as I could summon to my aid in
the brief time at my disposal. They were all seated at the table
already--supper is not a movable feast in that well-regulated
establishment--save Aunt Elizabeth. Her place was vacant.

"Sorry to be late," said I, after respectfully saluting my
mother-in-law, "but I couldn't help it. Things turned up at the last
minute and they had to be attended to. Where's Aunt Elizabeth?"

"She went to New York," said my mother-in-law, "on the 5.40 train."

VII. THE MARRIED SON, by Henry James

It's evidently a great thing in life to have got hold of a convenient
expression, and a sign of our inordinate habit of living by words. I
have sometimes flattered myself that I live less exclusively by them
than the people about me; paying with them, paying with them only, as
the phrase is (there I am at it, exactly, again!) rather less than my
companions, who, with the exception, perhaps, a little--sometimes!--of
poor Mother, succeed by their aid in keeping away from every truth, in
ignoring every reality, as comfortably as possible. Poor Mother, who is
worth all the rest of us put together, and is really worth two or three
of poor Father, deadly decent as I admit poor Father mainly to be,
sometimes meets me with a look, in some connection, suggesting that,
deep within, she dimly understands, and would really understand a
little better if she weren't afraid to: for, like all of us, she lives
surrounded by the black forest of the "facts of life" very much as
the people in the heart of Africa live in their dense wilderness of
nocturnal terrors, the mysteries and monstrosities that make them seal
themselves up in the huts as soon as it gets dark. She, quite exquisite
little Mother, would often understand, I believe, if she dared, if she
knew how to dare; and the vague, dumb interchange then taking pl